2020 and Family
This isn’t a Vine, or a Tweet or a TikTok Dance…
Obviously family is big, be it good or bad. We would barely be human without family.
We see Jacinda Ardern suckling her baby in parliament, and Donald Trump…
2020 has made everything more. I typically see my NZ family annually. It is a nice round number… If I chose I could see them every month, or 3 months or 6 months. It is hard to determine such things but every year ticks a lot of boxes.
This year is different for two big reasons:
- The lockdown has accentuated things. When you can’t have something, you want it more
- My parents are moving. Hundreds of miles. The last time they did this I was a quite un-functional young adult, and they didn’t tell me (I was far, far away).
Now, for the first adult time, I could “help out”.
Not really. A generation ago we would have steadfastly been DIY. Car and trailer, fifty trips, beer crates full of spare taps. Cats. Well-worn furniture.
This time, we are all older, wiser, and actually have some money. “People” will do the work. If I were there, it would be for moral support only, while two decades ago it would have been hard slog. Good slog.
But I can’t be there, for the biggest transition my parents have had in decades. Not even for moral support. Meanwhile my kids who I have hung out with every second weekend for years… that has become very difficult to achieve.
There’s always a bright side, and the missing of family in 2020 will hopefully mean heightened love, everywhere, going forward.